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12 issues of SHERLOCK HOLMES adventures brought to you by Stanford University in 2006.

Sherlock Holmes,

Consulting Detective

April 12 14 of 12 2006 A SHERLOCK HOLMES ADVENTURE: THE FINAL PROBLEM A Brief Farewell to our Readers And Some Thoughts about 2007 e hope that you’ve enjoyed reading these adventures as much as we’ve enjoyed sending them to you – to all m 13,000 of you! And we assume that For more notes, illustrations, youW are as grieved by Sherlock Holmes’s passing as and background information, were Conan Doyle’s readers in 1893. Victorian read- ers had to wait into the new century for the author to please visit our website at capitulate to his public and bring the detective back to http://sherlockholmes.stanford.edu life in “The Adventure of the Empty House.” You will have to wait only nine months. In January of 2007, we will bring Sherlock Holmes back to life and begin a new series of his adventures. Join us and meet the elu- classrooms across the country, where a new generation sive Mycroft Holmes, venture further into the mind of Holmes enthusiasts is taking shape. and affections of Sherlock Holmes, as well as into the Look for an email from us in November, inviting holdings of Stanford’s Special Collections. you to subscribe again to the 2007 project, or just go to We are grateful to all of you for your enthusiasm our website after November 2006, and sign up again. for the project, as well as for your patience with the Best Regards from sometimes erratic delivery of your weekly copies. We Stanford’s Sherlock Holmes Team are especially indebted to those of you who have con- Stanford Continuing Studies tributed to this project. Your generosity has made it Stanford University Libraries possible for us to send Sherlock Holmes to homes and Stanford Alumni Association

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Conan Doyle and his first wife Lou- ise in the Alps, at around the time Conan Doyle “killed” Sherlock The Swiss boys staring at Conan Doyle and his Holmes. From friends might never have seen skis before. Skiing was The Strand Maga- a Scandinavian sport that Conan Doyle helped intro- zine (1894). duce to Switzerland.

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“He saw the question in my eyes, and, putting his “Never have I risen to such a height, and never have I finger-tips together and his elbows upon his knees, he been so hard pressed by an opponent.” Compare this explained the situation.” From McClure’s Magazine, Moriarty to Sidney’s Paget’s—Edwards’s is heavier, vol. II, no. 1, January 1894. Illustrated by Harry Ed- less reptilian, and more like a stereotypical villain wards. (2) from a melodrama. (4)

It is with a heavy heart that I take up my pen to write papers on May 7th, and finally the recent letters to these the last words in which I shall ever record the which I have alluded. (1) singular gifts by which my friend Mr. Sherlock Hol- Reuters, opened in London in 1851 by a German mes was distinguished. (1) immigrant named Paul Julius Reuter, began by re- The “Final Problem” appeared in The Strand porting stock market quotations between European Magazine in December, 1893, although the events countries by telegraph. Where no telegraph lines had narrated therein are supposed to take place in 1891. yet been strung, Reuter used carrier pigeons. Later, The Strand’s reading public was outraged by what they Reuters developed into a news dispatch service that considered the premature death of a beloved charac- used telegraph and radio to transmit the news from ter. Over 20,000 people cancelled their subscriptions, overseas to British newspapers. and the magazine nearly went under. Forever after, The Strand’s staff referred to Holmes’s death as “the ...and I received two notes from Holmes, dated from dreadful event.” Narbonne and from Nimes.... (1) At his “death” in “The Final Problem,” Holmes is Narbonne and Nîmes are French cities, both lo- younger than most people think, perhaps because Sid- cated in the south. ney Paget’s drawings give him an air of maturity. In “His Last Bow,” which takes place in 1914 (and is told “Of air-guns.” (1) in the third person, not by Watson), Conan Doyle Because they use compressed air to shoot pro- puts Holmes’s age at about 60. Holmes could have jectiles, air guns are much quieter than guns using been born in or around 1854. In “The Final Prob- powder. Some Victorian gentlemen carried air guns lem,” therefore, he is not yet 40. disguised as canes. Holmes’s reasons for fearing air guns becomes clearer in “The Empty House.” ...“Study in Scarlet,” up to the time of his interference in the matter of the “Naval Treaty”.... (1) “At the age of twenty-one he wrote a treatise upon A Study in Scarlet was the first Holmes and Wat- the Binomial Theorem, which has had a European son story, a novelette published in Beeton’s Christmas vogue....” (2) Annual in late 1887. “The Naval Treaty,” published in Discovered by Euclid, and developed by Pascal The Strand in October and November, 1893, predated and Newton, the binomial theorem expresses the ex- “The Final Problem” by a month. pansion of a binomial (two variables added together) raised to a power. As far as I know, there have been only three accounts in the public press: that in the Journal de Genève on “But the man had hereditary tendencies of the most May 6th, 1891, the Reuter’s dispatch in the English diabolical kind. A criminal strain ran in his blood, NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS which, instead of being modified, was increased and “...I went out about midday to transact some business rendered infinitely more dangerous by his extraordi- in Oxford Street. As I passed the corner which leads nary mental powers.” (2) from Bentinck Street on to the Welbeck Street cross- Here, Conan Doyle refers to 19th-century scientist ing a two-horse van furiously driven whizzed round Cesare Lombroso’s theory of the “born” or “atavistic” and was on me like a flash.” (6) criminal. Moriarty is an exception among atavistic These are the names of actual London streets. criminals who appear in literature, however; instead of Holmes is just a few blocks from the foot of Baker having limited mental powers commensurate with his Street when he is attacked. increased animal appetites, he possesses both criminal intent and extraordinary intelligence. Many readers “...but as I walked down Vere Street....” (6) have noticed that Moriarty is an evil twin of Holmes, Vere Street turns into New Bond Street on the who turns his powers to crime instead of justice. south side of Oxford Street. “...and the rope for all of them....” (4) “I took a cab after that and reached my brother’s In other words, they will all be hanged. rooms in Pall Mall, where I spent the day.” (6) Sherlock hides out at his brother Mycroft Hol- “I was sitting in my room thinking the matter over, mes’s lodgings, across the street from his club, the when the door opened and Professor Moriarty stood Diogenes, where speaking to another member can be before me.” (4) cause for expulsion. Both Mycroft’s apartment and Moriarty only appears in two Holmes stories: the Diogenes are located near many other prestigious “The Final Problem” and the last of the four Hol- clubs, somewhere along Pall Mall. mes novels, The Valley of Fear. (Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock’s brother, only appears in three, although he “...and you will drive to the Strand end of the is mentioned in several others.) Nevertheless, read- Lowther Arcade....” (7) ers have remained fascinated with Sherlock Holmes’s The Lowther Arcade is a small, covered shopping dark opposite. Writers of pastiches of Conan Doyle’s work have taken great liberties with Moriarty’s char- acter. Was he indeed “the Napoleon of crime,” or was he an innocent scapegoat for some dark obsession of Holmes’s? Modern reworkings of the Conan Doyle canon, such as Nicholas Meyer’s The Seven Percent So- lution, often concentrate on Holmes’s unique psychol- ogy, in which Moriarty figures prominently. “His shoulders are rounded from much study, and his face protrudes forward, and is for ever slowly oscillating from side to side in a curiously reptilian fashion.” (5) Holmes describes Moriarty in reptilian terms, as if his lack of humanity can be discerned in his physical makeup. “‘You have less frontal development than I should have expected,’ said he at last.” (5) In the 18th-century pseudo-science, phrenology, frontal development was believed to indicate great in- telligence. This idea, like other phrenological beliefs, eventually found its way into the anthropology of the time, which used racial characteristics as an indica- tor of evolutionary advancement. Moriarty’s remark is meant as an insult to Holmes’s brain capacity; Moriarty’s own skull “domes out in a white curve,” as Holmes himself notes.

“‘You hope to place me in the dock. I tell you that I “‘My dear Watson,’ he said, ‘I write these few lines will never stand in the dock.’” (5) through the courtesy of Mr. Moriarty, who awaits my At British trials, the accused stands on a small convenience for the final discussion of those questions platform surrounded by a railing—the dock. which lie between us.’” (13) NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS bazaar, specializing in toys, located between two then he lived in an area near several hospitals, located buildings across The Strand from Charing Cross quite close to the place where Holmes was attacked. Station. The roof is studded with glass domes that provide natural light in the daytime. “It was my brother Mycroft.” (8) Mycroft Holmes, known both for his brilliant mind Dear Lowther Arcade! Oftimes have we wan- and his sedentary habits, apparently made an exception dered agape among thy enchanted palaces.... I to his usual aversion to action in order to accommodate have heard that thou art vulgar, but I cannot see Watson. Besides this story, he appears in two others, how, unless it be that tattered children haunt thy “The Greek Interpreter” and “The Bruce-Partington portals, those awful yet smiling entrances to so Plans,” and is mentioned in two more. Mycroft is much joy. To the Arcade there are two entrances, deeply involved behind the scenes in the British gov- and with much to be sung in laudation of that ernment. which opens from the Strand yet I on the whole “This train stops at Canterbury; and there is always prefer the other as truly romantic, because it is at least a quarter of an hour’s delay at the boat.” (8) there the tattered ones congregate.... Canterbury is located on the way to Dover, a port The passage above is from J.M. Barrie (1860- at the end of a rail line on the south coast of England. 1937), The Little White Bird (1902), an early version From Dover, one could take the steamboat (today the of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, which Barrie later ferry or hovercraft) across the English Channel to Cal- wrote into his famous play, Peter Pan. Barrie and ais, France. Conan Doyle were close friends. “Well, then we must make a cross-country journey to ...clambering over the wall which leads into Mortimer Newhaven, and so over to Dieppe.” (9) Street.... (7) Instead of boarding the steamboat across the If Watson’s rooms backed on Mortimer Street, English Channel to France at Dover, they will travel overland to Newhaven and from there take the ferry to Dieppe, France. Today, although a train tunnel has been bored underneath the English Channel, several different ferry routes are available to France, some longer than others. Newhaven-Dieppe is one of the longest “...a coup-de-maître....” (9) A master stroke. We sat in the Strasburg salle-à-manger arguing the question for half an hour.... (10) Strasburg (or Strasbourg) is a city on the border between France and Germany. After enjoying a cen- tury of independence, it passed back and forth between France and Germany until the end of World War II. In Holmes’s time it belonged to Germany, but was returned to France after World War I. During World War II, it reverted to German control, but today is part of France. The salle-à-manger is the dining room at the train station. For a charming week we wandered up the valley of the Rhone, and then, branching off at Leuk, we made our way over the Gemmi Pass, still deep in snow, and so, by way of Interlaken, to Meiringen. (10) Leuk is a city located in the valley of the Rhone “An examination by experts leaves little doubt that River, which flows down out of the Alps into France, a personal contest between the two men ended, as it and on to the Mediterranean Sea. Leuk is surrounded could hardly fail to end in such a situation, in their by picturesque mountains that rise abruptly from the reeling over, locked in each other’s arms.” (13) valley floor. Nearby Leukerbad, at a much higher al- NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS

titude, is a famous ski see them. (11) resort and spa. The Reichenbach Falls, one of the highest waterfalls in steep Gemmi pass the Alps, consists of five separate cascades down the leads up across the side of a mountain. Today—an even bigger tourist Alps, to the town of attraction because of its association with Holmes—it Interlaken and the tiny can be visited by cable railway. In the terminal is a hamlet of Meiringen. plaque commemorating Holmes’s “death” at the falls. Conan Doyle was one of the first to prac- She had wintered at Davos Platz and was journeying tice the sport of down- now to join her friends at Lucerne, when a sudden hill skiing in Switzer- hemorrhage had overtaken her. (11) land. He had seen Tuberculosis and its deadly effects were much on Conan Doyle playing in the skiers in Norway, and Conan Doyle’s mind because of his wife’s precarious snow at around the time he wondered if the sport condition. The scenario described here must have “killed” Sherlock Holmes. might be good for his been his worst nightmare. From The Strand Magazine wife’s tuberculosis. (1894). Later, he wrote about There was Holmes’s Alpine-stock still leaning against his adventures on skis the rock by which I had left him. (12) for an illustrated ar- Holmes’s sturdy walking-stick still leans against ticle in The Strand Magazine, “An Alpine Pass on Ski” the rock—a poignant reminder of his absence. The (1894), in which he freely, and humorously, admitted Alpine-stock, the silver cigarette case, the little scrap his ineptness at the sport. of paper—these have become icons of Holmes’s dis- Once, I remember, as we passed over the Gemmi, appearance (the deerstalker cap has slipped into films and walked along the border of the melancholy and illustrations of “The Final Problem,” although it Daubensee.... (10) does not appear in the original text). The Gemmi Pass leads past the Daubensee, a small, high-altitude lake (over 7,000 feet above sea level). It was on the third of May that we reached the little village of Meiringen, where we put up at the Englischer Hof, then kept by Peter Steiler the elder. (10-11) Meiringen—in legend, the birthplace of me- ringue—was known for being especially accommo- dating to English visitors in Conan Doyle’s time. He stayed there several times. Today, there is a Sherlock Holmes museum in Meiringen—advertised as the most authentic in the world—where it is possible to buy a combined ticket to visit the museum and tour the Reichenbach Falls. Our landlord was an intelligent man and spoke excel- lent English, having served for three years as waiter at the Grosvenor Hotel in London. (11) A venerable London hotel located near Bucking- ham Palace. ...with the intention of crossing the hills and spending the night at the hamlet of Rosenlaui.... (11) Rosenlaui is a tiny village in a rugged gorge of the same name, and serves as a welcome resting place for travelers between strenuous hikes. “As I turned away I saw Holmes, with his back We had strict injunctions, however, on no account to against a rock and his arms folded, gazing down pass the falls of Reichenbach, which are about half- at the rush of the waters. It was the last that I was way up the hills, without making a small detour to ever destined to see of him in this world.” (12) DISCOVERING SHERLOCK HOLMES NON-PROFIT ORG STANFORD CONTINUING STUDIES U.S. POSTAGE 482 GALVEZ STREET PAID STANFORD UNIVERSITY PALO ALTO, CA STANFORD, CALIFORNIA 94305-6079 PERMIT NO. 28

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